i have suffered with visible issues with my right leg since my second pregnancy. the visible issues were discoloration, excessive heat from the discolored region on ocassion, and swelling every so often. over the years the discoloration had started to fade or fix, but the swelling was seemingly increasing. then a couple years back, i started have pain, eventually almost daily discomfort. the swelling is sometimes as bad as almost double my leg. at the urging of my aunt, i decided to go to the doctor.
i'm not sure what i expected, but the doctor confirmed that i had a vein that's diameter was just about twice what it's normal diameter was. the back pressure was likely causing the pain and the valves in my lower leg in that vein were no longer working properly. we tried other means of fixing this--non-surgical--but it wasn't helping. we requested and finally received approval from my insurance to have the vein surgically closed. i did a lot of research--there is minimal risk to the procedure. even the things that did scare me couldn't overcome the fact that sometimes the pain would wake me up in the middle of the night. surgery, chicken sh*t or not, was my only option at this point. so we scheduled my appointment.
now for those your that don't know, this type of surgery is out-patient. it's supposed to take an hour and a half-ish. they don't knock you out--they give you a pill to help relax you and local pain killers (aka. shots of novacaine i think) as they stick stuff into the veins (laser lead i think) to burn shut the vein. this particular vein goes from the groin to the lower leg and they have to close it the whole way. ok, i'm a wuss--i don't like needles. i don't like being poked by them. i'm not thrilled in any way, shape or form that someone needs to put metal anything into my body--and my goofy butt still has steel in my arm. out-patient or not, i'm definately not a surgery fan. to me, this has to be the only other option. unfortunately, this was the case this time. if i didn't want to let it get worse and possibly, according to my research, get to the point where they wouldn't be able to do anything for it (this is super serious damage--years and years) and be completely immobilized. yes, surgery outweighed the long term risk.
so today i had my surgery. now anyone that knows me knows that i'm basically an anomoly, and my surgery went from being an hour--hour and a half--to 2 and a half hours....this was painful at times. i'm not even going to explain. when the doctor got done, he told me that i had an extra branch to the vein that needed to be closed. the extra branch wasn't able to cut off from flow by just shutting the main body of the vein. oh, hell no, my branch had to be closed also. he told me that this occurs in 15% of the patients. heck, i told him, if he had told me that before hand i could've guessed that would me. i'm always that goofy anomoly--only 15%...yes, i will be part of that 15% instead of the simpler 85%. just the way i've been all my life, no reason to expect that to change now. he and the nurse laughed when i said, "yep, always the odd duck."
but let me say--yes, i might have had the 15% case--but the first 1.5 hours weren't a cake walk either. so i'm wondering what idiot does this just for cosmetic reasons? just because you don't like the way it looks? for most people, the visual issues are all they ever have to deal with. the pain that i endured today wasn't for the weak-hearted. it's a friggin' wire, basically, shoved up your vein the length of your leg--assuming you are the odd duck like me and don't have that extra branch. and my extra branch mimicked almost the same length of my leg....ugh...there was a point that my eyes started welling up because the pain was a little more than i could hold in. the smell of burning shut the vein wasn't exactly like apple cobbler either. i don't know what idiots go and do this for cosmetics, but these people seriously need to have their heads examined.
i have a very sexy compression over it now. (bridge in brooklyn people, if you buy that a compression stocking is in the slightest way sexy...) when we tried this to alleviate the pain, i could still feel heat coming from swelled and discolored area. no heat is coming through now. i'm thrilled. i actually feel great. and my leg isn't feeling any pain--although that might be remnants of the novacaine. we'll follow up and see how well it took over the next week. but i'm still thinking only an idiot would choose this if they didn't have the pain i was having. the pain of the actual surgery is too much for just appearances. i know i wouldn't recommend it if you don't have to. on the other hand, if it eliminates the pain that i've been enduring daily--it might have been considerably more, but then i would recommend it to anyone suffering from the pain and swelling.
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